


False Truths

by BatchSan



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Community: smut_fest, Forced Exhibitionism, Friendship, Fuck Or Die, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Romance, Science Fiction, Secrets, Slash, Utopia, Violence, Xeno
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-27
Updated: 2013-05-27
Packaged: 2017-12-13 03:30:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/819448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BatchSan/pseuds/BatchSan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three friends discover that their technological utopian world has a disturbing secret.</p>
            </blockquote>





	False Truths

**Author's Note:**

  * For [empty_room](https://archiveofourown.org/users/empty_room/gifts).



> Written for the Dystopian/Apocalypse round of [Smut_Fest](http://smut-fest.livejournal.com). 
> 
> I've never written this level of sci-fi before but I'm proud of the end result. =)

There's a familiar, yet annoying, beeping coming from the table across the room. Groaning, Maddock flips over and prays that it'll stop even though he knows better. Whoever the hell is contacting him at five in the morning better be having a heart attack or something - which probably wouldn't make sense for them to contact him since emergency services is an unmistakable large, red app on the touch screen of everybody's Compuservers. The beeping persists no matter what position he tries to hide in to escape it, so with a groan he tosses his pillow onto the floor and gets up. Rubbing his eyes as he pads barefoot over to his Compuserver, Maddock sinks into the chair, placing his left hand in the scanner on the table. It accepts him with a sickeningly sweet _Hello!_ and the large touchscreen lights up to allow him to see the same things it always does. A scene of the sky outside, which is still dark, the temperature, the time, a headline in the bottom of current event news - parties and new keyboards and stuff like that - and there in the middle of all of that is his friend’s – Aden - face.

"Dude, do you know what time it is?" Maddock asks, yawning.

"Morning time," Aden deadpans.

"Awesome. You woke me up to feed me sarcasm. Fucking beautiful."

"No, actually, I didn't. I found some interesting information I thought you'd like to see about that thing we've been discussing."

Okay, maybe this was worth getting up at this ungodly hour. "The City?" 

He nods and slides his finger across his screen. A second later, Maddock’s email blinks.

"I’ve sent you what I found. Already sent it to Tiny, but haven't heard from her yet. She's probably still sleeping."

Maddock scowls at him as he taps the picture of an envelope on the screen. _’Of course he'd be a dick to wake me up but not her’_ , Maddock silently thinks. Aden shoots him a smirk that sends a small shiver up his spine, forcing him to look away quickly to read what he sent. It takes Maddock a full five minutes to actually read through the wall of text in the email, and it's completely worth it. Aden's waiting patiently when he looks up at him again.

"Is this real?"

"Do you know half the shit I went through to get it? It better be real."

"Yeah, but..." Maddock leans back in his chair and stares up at the ceiling. 

Reaching out with his left hand again, Maddock hits a well-worn button beside the ID scanner and in a few seconds, a steaming hot cup of coffee emerges from a panel in the wall beside the Compuserver table. There's no way he’s going back to bed after reading that email. It's actually a lot to digest, and if it's true, _fuck_.

"I always knew something was weird about this whole setup we have going. How is it normal to just live locked up for the large majority of your life in a room? I mean, yeah, cool, we have almost everything we need right here at our fingertips," Maddock says, tapping the button beside the coffee one for emphasize. A few seconds later, a warm bagel with cream cheese emerges from the panel in the wall. "But it always felt so unnatural, and this thing, if it's real, just proves that."

"I'd say so."

"I think... No, that's too crazy. Let's get Tiny up and discuss this properly."

"Not it," Aden says quickly with a smile.

"Fucker," Maddock grumbles.

"Hey, it was your suggestion. Makes sense you'd have the honor of waking her up."

Reluctantly, Maddock opens up his contact list on the screen and scrolls down until Tiny's name comes into view. Ever since the two of them had been in middle education classes together, where they would send each other private messages about which games they liked best until the teacher caught on and blocked them from talking to each during class hours, they had been close friends. In short, Maddock is well aware of how much Tiny hated being woken up before her alarm clock went off. Clicking her icon brought up a new screen beneath Aden's - who was now pretending to be busy with something. Ten rings later, she finally appears, disheveled looking and not happy one bit.

"'Morning, beautiful," Maddock tries, hoping to appeal to his friend’s womanly vanity.

"Dok, I swear to god I am going to find where you live and set your bed on fire."

Or not.

"Um, it's all Aden's fault, but he found something really interesting that you shoul--"

"I don't need another video game patch!"

"It's not like that, Ti. It's about the City!"

This finally quiets her tirade and she glares at Maddock as she reaches for her screen to, presumably, check her mail. She goes quiet for a long time; Aden texts Maddock to find out how it's going. When Maddock tells him she's reading the email, Aden nods on-screen and goes back to whatever it is he's pretending, or not, to do. When she finally looks up, he can see the excitement in her eyes. She quickly patches Aden through so she can speak to both men at the same time.

"Where did you even find this?" she asks Aden.

He shrugs. "You know me. No sleep lets you get ahead."

"Yeah, bullshit, but whatever. This is big guys. It really exists!"

"Yep," Maddock agrees. "It's not even far away. We could get there within two days or less, probably."

Aden and Tiny go silent at this, looking nervous. Maddock doesn't have to ask them what's up because it's beyond obvious to him. People don't really go out often. They rarely interact face-to-face unless there's an itch needed to be scratched, they fall in love with someone, or something breaks down in their room. There's no real reason to go out beyond that. Humans live with their mothers for the first few years of life, and then they get their own rooms and that is pretty much the depth of person-to-person interaction in their world.

But it wasn't always like that.

Maddock knows this well because his father traveled from another city-hive to meet his mother, whom he'd been in love with since some years prior. On the way, he managed to stop at an abandoned building just outside of this city-hive and found all kinds of old world books inside, hidden away in a vault that had recently rusted open. He brought the books as a present, but Maddock’s mother held little interest in them and when he was old enough to get his own room, she gave them to him. They had all kinds of information about the world before the Start. The Start was a time when the old world had evolved into the world humans now knew. The old world had been full of murder, disease, crime, and pollution, but then the Start happened and the world rebooted. All the bad things disappeared after that. It was the utopian dream from centuries, if not millennia, before, but not many people alive today knew that. Aside from what they were taught.

"It's not so crazy to go on a road trip, is it? We'll say we're heading to another city-hive to meet up with some 'partners' and we'll be fine," Maddock tries to assure them. "I know we've never met each other in person, but will it really be so much different than talking to each other like this?"

Aden looks uncomfortable enough to want to hide and Tiny falls unnaturally quiet on her end. 

"Guys, it'll be okay. We can make it on our own."

"No, you can make it on your own," Tiny says. "You've always had that drive in you, but Aden is too attached to his Compuserver, and I... I just don't like the idea. You don't want to just go visit the City, you want to live there, Dok. We're not blind to that screaming fact."

"You both read the same file I did, right? It says right there that the failed city was capable of supporting life, just not technology. Technology has stymied us far too much for this to even be a discussion. So what if we have to make our own coffee or grow our own food? Our ancestors did it and they lived long enough to have kids and their kids did the same, up until the Start. If not for them, we wouldn't even exist."

"Look, Dok,” Tiny says, “you make a great point and all, but it's probably not as easy as you think it is. Our ancestors weren't raised from birth with technology like we were. We could sit here all day and talk about all the things we'll be able to do on our own, but ultimately, experiencing something firsthand and talking about it are two different things," Tiny says.

"I agree," Aden chimes in.

Reluctantly, Maddock nods in agreement.

"You're right, of course, but that's why it'll be better if it's the three of us. We can help each other. Tiny, you know about gardening - you show us your flowers all the time. They're beautiful and amazing and so do not belong in a place like this. They deserve to be grown in real dirt and last forever. And Aden, you know fucking everything. Like, I don't even know how you do it half the time, but you always have all the answers. Hell, you were the one that learned about the City to begin with! Imagine what else you know that would help us,” Maddock says, standing up. "I have the knowledge of our ancestors from my books. I have faith we can do this, and you both know what? I could probably just go out there on my own, but it'd be pointless if I don't have my two best friends along for the ride."

"Maddock..." Aden says, his lips a thin line of worry.

"Wait." Maddock holds up his hand before Aden goes any further. "Okay, how about this: We just go check it out. Literally, that's it. Come with me to check out the City. Maybe we'll find more old world books, or just evidence of the old world. We can survive a few days on our own, we all know that much, even though some of us are terrified of the idea."

Aden and Tiny exchange glances and sigh at practically the exact same time.

"Fine," Tiny says, "but if anything happens, I'm going to seriously light your bed on fire."

"And I'll help," Aden adds with a small smile.

"Tiny's been threatening to light my bed on fire for twelve years, I think we'll be okay."

\--

Nervously, Maddock stands on a street corner, waiting and waiting. And waiting.

“Figures they would be late to our very first face-to-face meeting,” he bitterly grumbles to himself. 

Or they got lost, which is easy if you don't venture out often, if at all. Still, the streets are clearly marked and everybody can easily pull up a map of their city-hive to find a way to the transport vehicles located at the four edges of it. Like everything in their rooms, the transport vehicles are set up in easy-to-use positions, right next to roadways that lead you directly to the next city-hive. With two roadways on each side of the city-hives, it's really hard to get lost, but that's if you're traveling along the roadways, not if you never leave your room and probably have no idea where you're going even despite the explicit directions given to you by a friend.

It's another half hour before Maddock finally sees a figure turn a corner and begin to approach. A thrill jumps up his spine when he realizes that it's Aden. As he waits, Maddock notices how much taller than him Aden is in person, with eyes so green in real sunlight that he feels a throb in his cock long before Aden makes it to him. The poor guy looks nervous as all hell, and it becomes even worse when Maddock offers a hand out to him for a handshake. At first, Aden doesn't seem like he wants to take the strange hand. When he does reach out finally, Maddock shivers a little at the actual contact. Aden laughs nervously when they release. A part of Maddock wants to throw his arms around the taller man’s waist and press him against the cement at their feet and… do things that aren’t too hard to imagine.

 _’Shit, have to pull myself together’_ , Maddock sighs internally. It’s not a good place or time to be fantasizing about the person he’d had a thing for since high school level classes.

"So it's really you," Aden says. 

Maddock notes that the bass of his voice on-screen does nothing to show off how sexy it is in person.

"Yeah, it is. Um, you look taller in person."

Maddock mentally kicks himself.

Aden smiles slightly in response and makes a sound of surprise at something over the shorter man’s shoulder. They both watch Tiny approach. She doesn't look as nervous as Aden had. She’s also sporting a small smile that eventually gives way to a larger one when she reaches the men. Before Maddock can even open his mouth, she punches his arm, hesitates, and throws her arms around him, laughing.

"Should've known you would greet me with a little violence."

"Couldn't help myself, not after all those times you screwed with me and I couldn't get back at you properly."

"Sorry."

She pulls away from Maddock and punches him again, lightly. While she greets Aden in a similar fashion, more hugging, less punching, Maddock can’t help take a moment to take in the full physical aspects of his long-time friends. Aden is really tall, with thin shoulders from being hunched over his keyboard for anywhere from thirteen to twenty hours a day. There had been more than one occasion when he stayed up for several days straight, not evening batting an eyelash at the sleep deprivation. Tiny, on the other hand, wasn't as small as her name described. She was a little shorter than Maddock, but he was five-foot-nine, so she had to be at least five-foot-six or seven. She was slightly chubby, but not outright fat. She avoided getting too rotund thanks to the fact that she kept somewhat active by keeping up her garden and going for runs around her room every few days. 

Maddock kept himself in shape by actually venturing outside of his building complex and going for walks around the city-hive. It's how he knows about the workings and layout of the transport vehicles, among other small, mostly meaningless things to others – like how there are robots that come out of panels on the sides of the building complexes. They keep the city-hive painstakingly clean, traveling along small runners that crisscross the streets and sides of the building complexes. 

"So, we're really going to do this?" Aden asks, shifting a small bundle from one hand to the other.

"The transport vehicle is already to go." Maddock gestures at a white transport vehicle a few paces away from them. "There's not much to it, luckily. We just get in, press a button, and off it goes toward the next city-hive."

"How are we supposed to get it to go to the City though?" Tiny asks.

"We're not. I've checked the map in that file Aden sent and, well, we have a lot of walking ahead of us," Maddock smiles uneasily at the looks he gets. "We'll use the transport vehicles to get us a little more than halfway there, but we'll have to walk the rest of the way. These things are made only to transport people from one city-hive to the next and back, not for random frolics through the open wilderness."

"Goddammit, Dok. I knew this was dumb," Tiny huffs.

"It's to be expected though, isn't it?" Aden says. "Did you look at the map, Ti? It's not a clear map, but it does clearly indicate a place off the linear layout of the roadways of the city-hives."

"Shit," she says as understanding sets in. She throws a glance at Maddock and sighs. "Well, let's get started already. We don't want to get stuck out in the opening in the dark. Anyone with two brain cells knows that.”

The men agree and they all gather inside of the transport vehicle. It’s only built for two people, but they manage to make it work well enough. The majority of the ride is spent in silence, fascination of the outside world taking over even Aden and Tiny’s initial hesitance. By the time hunger kicks in, they’ve all relaxed better to each other’s presence, for the most part. Tiny produces sandwiches from her spare blanket bundle that they share in more silence.

Four hours later, Maddock yawns and gets as comfortable as he can in his seat.

“I’m going to catch a little shut-eye. Will you keep an eye out for our stop, Aden?”

Nodding, Aden projects the map onto the windowpane and studies it for a moment. Maddock watches him do so until Aden's green eyes meet up with his own brown ones. He blushes a little.

“We’ve got another two hours before our figurative stop comes up. I’ll wake you before then,” he says. “One question, though: how was your father able to stop his transport vehicle? They’re not supposed to stop until they’ve reached the next city-hive, so how did he manage it?”

“Easy,” Maddock says, “the vehicles stop when the doors are opened while it's in motion. It’s probably a fail-safe for those suffering from their first case of motion sickness, or in case of an emergency. Sort of dumb, but smart too since I doubt the average person would think to just up open the door mid-motion without a reason.”

“I see. That must be where you get your own quirky strangeness, huh?” 

At the sight of Aden’s smile, Maddock feels at peace with life and slips into an easy sleep.

\--

They all died.

Or that’s what Maddock thinks when he wakes with a start, the imagery from his dream still fresh in his mind. His hand is shaking when he reaches up to brush his dark hair away from his face and it takes a lot of deep breaths to get it back under control. When he looks over, Tiny is snoozing away in her seat as she had been when Maddock first fell asleep. Seeing her safe relieves him. Past her, Aden’s watching him curiously, his expression torn between wanting to help and worried.

“I had a bad dream,” Maddock explains calmly to the other man.

“Seemed really bad.”

“Yeah…”

Maddock trails off with a nod, turning away to make it clear he didn’t want to talk about. He draws his attention first out the window at the green scenery outside, then to the projected map on the windowpane before him. They weren’t far off from their stop and had his nightmare not scared him awake, Aden’s shaking would have. He wasn’t sure whether he should be disappointed or not.

\--

When the time comes, they wake Tiny up – Aden does it this time. Making sure they’re all prepared a few minutes later, Maddock counts to ten and eases open the transport vehicle’s door. As he had said, or rather, as his father had said, the car draws to a slow stop and they climb out, taking their little bundles made from blankets with them.

“Should we close the door and send it onward to the next city-hive?” Tiny asks, looking unhappy even before asking.

“No. We’ll be back in a few hours and we’ll want some transportation when we get back.”

Aden nods in agreement with Maddock’s statement and they depart from the roadway, heading northeast from the road. They walk for an hour, then another, with copious amounts of stops for rest. The day grows warmer, but never too hot, not that that helps their situation much. Aden’s the one that thinks ahead to bring bottles of water, which he produces from his blanket bundle for the trio when they make their fifth stop to rest. Revitalize, they head on until Tiny begins to voice complaints of wasting their time.

“Just a bit further.” Maddock tries to assure her.

“My ass…”

Eventually, they come to a bridge, the roadway leading to it lost to time and nature. It’s clear what’s on the other side of the bridge though as they tilt their heads back to see the building complexes that rise high into the sky. What was left of them that is. As they carefully cross the bridge, they note the skeletal remains of steel frames stubbornly trying to hold strong against time. Once they’ve crossed the bridge, they pause just past the first buildings, looking in awe at their discovery. The air feels heavier here; smelt like copper and rot as well. Aden coughed and covered his mouth and nose with the neck of his gray shirt, as though afraid to inhale dirt or whatever else lingered in the air here. As a precaution, Maddock and Tiny follow suit. 

The whole place is strange to them, overall. City-hives didn't look like this, with building complexes here and there spread out in a mix of too tall and too low structures. Back at the city-hives, building complexes were streamlined and tiny, stacked up high and in tight cloisters. Old world people seemed to enjoy varying their amount of rooms in these building complexes from too little to just right. It almost seemed like they essentially enjoyed wasting space or just enjoyed experimenting with it. It seemed wrong – maybe that’s why the City had failed? 

"We should go," Tiny says, kicking at the metal frame of an ancient transport vehicle. It creaks angrily as if dying and takes a defiant last agonizing breath. Birds on a nearby rooftop take off with a start, flying in circles high into the sky.

Despite that, Maddock’s curiosity draws him forward. He steps past the ancient transport vehicle and steps into the first ruined opening in his immediate sight. The dust inside is so thick Maddock can actually see it swirl in the air when he kicks aside fallen pieces of ceiling from the floor above. Looking up only reveals large holes where the ceiling had rotted or collapsed. The walls were filthy but there's just a faint marking of what appeared to be some kind of paper on one section of wall. The markings on it are indiscernible but Maddock finds the fact that people once used paper to decorate their walls somewhat interesting. Stepping back outside, Aden and Tiny are standing in the same spot, rooted there by their fears. Waving them over to join him yields Maddock nothing more than shakes of heads, so he returns to his explorations. What’s the point of coming all the way out here to just turn back right away?

It's as Maddock is examining the sturdiness of some stairs inside a third building complex that he hears a scream from outside. Every hair on his body stands on end as he forces himself to not run, but creep quickly to the hole where he had entered through just moments before. Neither Aden nor Tiny are where Maddock had left them. Neither one is in sight at all, actually. One could hope they maybe had finally gone off to explore and then something happened. Not liking the high odds of that happening, he calls their names but gets no response other than a squawk of some birds in the distance. 

"If you guys are hiding just to punish me, then job well done because I'm seriously worried!" Maddock yells down the empty street. "Seriously, cut this shit out guys. Where are you?"

Nothing.

With his heart pounding in my ears in earnest fear, Maddock begins running to every decrepit building complex opening in the vicinity. A quick peek inside -- nothing -- and onto the next until he’s checked every foreseeable opening on the street. He stands panting in the intersection opposite where they had entered the City from. He’s not dumb enough to believe they wandered off further into the City, so something must have happened. Turning quickly, he jogs back to where they entered the City, but still can't find a sign of either of them, not even on the bridge. 

"Aden! Tiny!" Maddock shouts, fear truly overtaking him now.

As he begins to check the building complex openings again, Maddock hears movement behind him. Spinning around quickly, all he spies is a flash of movement before something heavy collides with the side of his head and he blacks out.

\--

When Maddock comes too, his head is spinning too much for him to open his eyes, so he remains seated wherever it is he's fallen and waits for the world to stop roaring in his head. It takes a minute for him to realize that he's restrained and sitting up against a wall, hands tied firmly behind his back. He forces his eyes open and sees nothing but rubble between his legs at first, but as he picks up his head, he notices a pair of shiny, black boots a few feet away from him. They don't match anything Aden or Tiny were wearing so he snaps his head up in surprise and loses his shit just a little.

"What the fuck?" he gasps.

A figure, most certainly not human, is standing before him. Its skin is tinted a faint teal color with a navy blue stripe running up each of its arms, at least up to where skin gives ways to the sleeves of a black skin-tight outfit; a uniform of some kind. Its hands had four fingers on each hand, which flex into fists upon his gaze dropping down to them. If not for those things and its darkt blue infused eyes, it could've passed for human, barring any other unseen alien anatomy or markings. It stands silently, just staring at Maddock and successfully making him feeling insignificant in its wake. Until it clicks in his head that maybe this is what happened to Aden and Tiny.

"Where are my friends?" Maddock asks. "What did you do to them?"

The alien tilts its head to the side, remaining silent. Just when he's convinced it's going spit at him or something, it shakes it head slowly, once.

"Superiors take friends," it says, pointing at you when it says _‘friends’_. Except for a small rasp at the end of its words, the voice is surprisingly human sounding. "Save you."

"Saved me? You knocked me unconscious!" Maddock yells and instantly wishes he could grab the side of his head that is now beginning to ache. "You could've killed me!"

Again it stares at him before doing the same strange one time shake of its head. "No kill. No want to kill."

“Well, what do you want? And better yet, what are you?”

“Help,” it answers to both.

Watching it approach makes Maddock tense up in fear. Apparently sensing this, it holds out its hands to show they’re free of weapons and slowly kneels beside him. One hand disappears behind Maddock’s back and whatever binding held his wrists together quickly falls away. Moving slowly himself, Maddock brings his hands forward and rubs his wrists before reaching up to gingerly touch the side of his head where he had been hit. There are no visible signs of blood, but maybe bruising, he figures. He lets his hand drop away because prodding the area hurts, and shifts away slightly from the creature still kneeling beside him.

“Are you going to tell me what’s going on or are you going to keep giving me vague and slightly cryptic answers?” Maddock asks, feeling on edge but knowing he isn’t strong enough to take on the creature.

There’s a long silence until the creature visibly sighs and sits with its legs crossed, back straight as if afraid slouching might destroy its spine. From a pocket Maddock had overlooked on its’ chest, the creature produces a small, flat tablet of some sort. Laying it flat in its hand, Maddock watches as it presses several spots on what appeared to be a screen and soon they were both looking at a holographic projection of the planet Earth. However, it wasn’t like the pictures Maddock had seen in his school level classes. It didn’t even look like the one picture of Earth he had found in his old world books.

The holographic Earth before him was battered and torn. The Earth Maddock had been led to believe existed was green and blue for miles on end. He had seen much greenery around his city-block and even along the roadway and trek to the City. True, it had become less vibrant the closer they had gotten to the City, but he had figured that was probably because no robots were around to help maintain it. But the Earth he was seeing told a different story – it spoke of dry land where large portions of the oceans had dried away and only patches of greenery around small dots that were likely city-blocks. The most disturbing thing was the amount of city-blocks that could be counted. The holograph rotated slowly, allowing him to count forty-eight city-blocks, half on opposite sides of the Earth, all neatly lined up to form rectangular formations. None of it was what school level classes had taught him and had led him to unblinkingly believe.

“What is this?” Maddock asks.

“Effects of the Start,” the creature answers. “Man warred violently with self. Destroyed much of planet with senseless violence. Man died by thousands.”

Pointing to itself, the creature continued. “Janxians help Man. Man angry at Janxians though. Janxians had to push them. Be mean to make them happy again. Erase memories of war. Make Man happy with computers and rooms. Man happy, yes?”

Maddock hesitated before nodding. 

“See? Good! But problem now.”

“Problem?”

“Superiors want to work Man. Make Man repay debt of happiness. Slaves. Superiors want slaves.”

“And you’re against this?” 

“Yes. Man good, nice Janxians made them happy. Should leave them alone, in happiness.”

The creature looks sad as it hangs its head, tired even, and Maddock feels a pang of pity for it. Unfortunately, the news does nothing to alleviate his worry about his friends. If anything happened to them, he would feel responsible for dragging them out here. Slaves - he recognized that word. It was from the old world, when people forced others to serve at their beck and call, all the time. They were forced to do the most humiliating tasks and were treated as things instead of people. Maddock felt sick to his stomach.

“Did they take my friends for this slavery thing?” Maddock asks, afraid of the answer.

The creature nods, once. “Could not save in time.”

“But there is still a chance to save them, right? There’s a way to rescue them?”

Silence.

“Please, you have to tell me!”

“Janxian have saying: Always a way to fix. Can fix if believe there is a way. Dangerous though.”

Getting to his feet, Maddock clenched his jaw and pulled himself together. “Doesn’t matter if it’s dangerous, I won’t leave my friends, and we have to do something about your superiors.”

The creature remains sitting for a moment longer before it stands and nods its head in agreement. 

“Axiom help then.”

“Axiom? That’s your name, right?”

“Yes.”

“I like it,” Maddock says with a smile. He swore teal cheeks grew darker for a moment. “I’m Maddock, but my friends call me Dok”

“I like Maddock,” Axiom says, smiling lightly.

“Maddock it is then.” For the second time that day, Maddock feels a small blush creep over his face.

\--

There was a hitch in their plan from the very beginning and it involved how could a human be snuck inside of an alien compound. Answer? It couldn’t. There was only one way to get the human in.

Maddock tore his clothes and scrapped his elbow against a rock until he bled, then smeared the blood across his face and hands. Axiom filled him in on what to expect when they entered the Janxian’s compound, including how security worked and what he would be expected to do as a ‘slave’ to keep himself alive.

“Superiors let Janxian keep slaves capture by ourselves from outside city-hives. Fair game,” Axiom explained. “Keep silent unless addressed. Eyes down too, all times. Axiom will keep you at my side. Just follow rules.”

“Okay,” Maddock says when he’s done. Thinking about it for a second, he scoops up dirt from the ground and mussed his hair with it, running his hands over his face and arms, and even lifting his shirt to get it on his stomach and sides. When he finishes, he is a mess of dirt and blood and with his head still aching, he was sure he’d be able to pull off a convincing dazed appearance.

“Maddock wear this. Mark of captured slave.”

He produces a bracelet from his back pocket and snaps it onto Maddock’s left wrist. It’s the same black as Axiom’s uniform and the rough material would chaff the human’s skin in no time, but Maddock nods when he’s asked if it fits him okay. Another light smile spreads over Axiom’s lips before he lets it drop and grips Maddock by his forearm beneath the bracelet.

“Ready?”

“Yeah.”

They march through the City for ten minutes before reaching a clearing where a rectangular area was free of building complexes and greenery. Axiom stopped at the edge of the clearing and stamps his foot against the ground five times, then reaches his hand out over the ground, palm face down. A red light comes up from the ground and sweeps over his palm, then vanishes as suddenly as it had appeared. Maddock nearly jumps away when the ground began to shift and an eight-by-ten area fell away to reveal stairs. He wants to ask questions about the Janxian compound, but as they begin to descend, Axiom reminds how important it is to keep his mouth shut. Instead of questions, Maddock settles for quietly kicking himself for not asking more questions as they descend below ground; the entrance they had stepped through closing up again once their heads cleared the top ground.

Maddock is struck in that moment with a real sense of dread. He’d been nervous, but it only now really begins to hit that things could go horribly for him. Not only could he never see his friends again, but who knew what had happened to them already or what will happen to them if he failed? His heart thuds as a feeling of claustrophobia begins to overtake him. He tries to focus on something to keep him calm and settles on the feel of Axiom’s hand on his arm. The hand is cooler than his normal body’s heat and it feels nice against his skin despite the tight grip. The fingertips have a slight pad on them that Maddock figured allows Janxians to grip things better. He wonders some about the Janxian’s home world and what kind of atmosphere it must’ve had to cause them to evolve the way they did. All of this helps Maddock’s moment of panic ebb back down to just a hum of unease in his chest. They stop before a doorway and while they wait for it to open, Axiom leans into him slightly.

“Please silence unless asked question. No good no listen.”

There’s an odd hint of a desperate plea in his voice that makes Maddock nod in understanding quickly. When the door opens, he hangs his head and only moves when Axiom tugs at his arm. After a few steps, there is the sound of clicks and strange words that he realizes must be the Janxians’ native language. More black boots come into view and from his peripheral Maddock can make out more teal skin aliens like Axiom. They all appear different in their own ways from different hairstyles, all black though, to subtle shifts in skin tone to even different blue stripes on their arms. They all wear the same uniform, which is as skintight on them as it is on Axiom, allowing him to tell the males from the females. They walk for a long time, turning down one corridor after the next until Maddock wants to ask where the hell they’re going. 

Finally they enter a room that’s wide and brighter than the corridors leaning to it had been. He walks a few paces and is made to stop, which he does. Axiom begins to speak in his strange native language until another voice cuts him off. The voice goes on for a moment, seemingly asking Axiom questions, which he answers quickly. His hand remains on Maddock’s arm until it tightens painfully when Axiom makes a shocked noise, visibly jerking. Maddock closes his eyes and waits anxiously for whatever was to come.

“Human, look up,” a deep voice commands.

Doing so, Maddock finds himself looking into eyes as green as emeralds. The alien attached to them is frowning and observes his face before it speaks again.

“You are slave now. Axiom caught you rightfully so you are his. You listen to him without question, understood?”

Maddock opens his mouth to answer, catches Axiom’s eye and quickly closes it, nodding his head in affirmation.

“Respect our ways and maybe we free you one day.” A deep clicking sound fills the room – a laugh, Maddock realizes. Something about the sound boils his blood and he clenches his fist.

“Ass,” he grumbles as low as his growing anger allows him to.

There’s an erupt inhale of breath from Axiom that makes Maddock’s stomach clench. The alien superior before him has also stopped laughing and is staring hard at him, as if daring him to speak again. Maddock glares back defiantly, anger building in him from a place he wasn’t aware existed.

“Axiom explained rules to you and yet you openly defy them.”

“He is learning, superior Nexium,” Axiom quickly says. “Axiom teach, human learn.”

Nexium tilts his head back and shakes it once in response. “No, you will teach slave respect now, in front of me.”

“But superior—“

“Should I teach you first, Axiom?”

The alien grimaces and shakes his head. “No, superior.”

“Then teach the slave.”

Nodding, Axiom turns Maddock around so they’re facing each other and releases his arm, but stays close to him. His blue eyes shift uncomfortably to Nexium before meeting the human’s. _’I’m sorry,’_ he mouths before reaching forward and placing a hand on the back of Maddock’s neck. He moves in quickly and presses their mouths together. Caught by surprise, Maddock can only stand shock still while Axiom continues to kiss him. A small tug of his hair snaps him back to reality enough for him to kiss back. It’s not until Axiom’s hand is on his shoulder, pushing him down that Maddock begins to realize where things are going. He pushes away, but Axiom’s hand on his shoulder keeps him from running off. There’s sadness written all over his face as Maddock tries to pull away again and if not for a heavy stamp of a foot, Maddock may have kept trying to escape until he had succeeded. Instead, he sinks down to his knees in defeat and hangs his head before Axiom. He’s not surprised when teal hands comb through his hair before pulling away to slide black pants down to reveal Axiom’s naked lower half.

“Slave pleases master,” Axiom says, but his voice is quiet.

Maddock studies the anatomy before him, mentally filling in what he’s already learned of Janxian anatomy. The skin is still teal here, as to be expected, and aside from the strange color and lack of hair in the region, everything else looks surprisingly human. Actually, a lot about Janxians appears to be ‘strangely’ human, not that it eases the kneeling man any. A gentle hand on his head guides him forward, urging him toward the male bit of anatomy very clearly in front of his face. With a tentative lick, Maddock tastes the alien, drawing a low huff of air from above. Another lick earns him a heavier huff. Each lick elicits a new sound from Axiom and the sounds go straight to Maddock’s loins making the whole situation even stranger than what it was for him. Things go well until Axiom becomes erect and not only does it happen once, but twice. Beneath the normal looking penis is a smaller, thinner one that appears to be more tentacle than penis, it’s even slightly barbed at the head.

“Shit…” 

He can’t help the word from slipping from his mouth and he regrets it right away. Axiom’s hold on his head becomes sharp as the hand in his hair balls up and forces his mouth to sloppily envelope the penis. Maddock shudders when the tentacle flickers at the underside of his chin.

“Slave no speak. Slave learn.”

Yeah, he gets the point this time. Axiom takes over control of his head and forces Maddock back and forth along his length until he’s groaning and clicking strangely aloud. Maddock gags and quickly learns to breathe through his nose to avoid suffocating. The strange tentacle attempts to get in on the action several times until Axiom pulls Maddock off his penis and allows the tentacle to take shelter inside the human’s mouth. If giving someone a forced blowjob had been odd for him, having a wiggly alien appendage in his mouth won all the awards for oddity in Maddock’s mind. Despite its size, it feels heavy on his tongue, and when it attempts to wrap itself around his tongue, Maddock wants to scream in horror and surprise. Chancing a glance up, the kneeling man could see Axiom panting, his face deeply flushed. Making eye contact actually makes the alien whimper a little, the sound odd in his throat. 

“Slave keep head down,” Axiom says with a bit of a sob as he pushs Maddock away. “Slave punish not listening.”

Maddock barely has a chance to brace himself when he’s flipped over, his jeans forced down to his knees.

“No…” he whispers. “Please…”

Despite his plea, Maddock is hard and hates himself for it. His plea is ignored as wet digits push into his anus, stretching him uncomfortably fast and not caring when he cries out in protest. When Axiom slides into him, Maddock sees stars and freely begins to cry when the alien begins to pound into him. His forehead touches the ground between his arms as he tries to hide his embarrassment but there’s a click of order from Nexium and his head is jerked upward. With an approving look, Nexium watches on as Maddock begs before settling on sobbing with each thrust into him.

To add insult to injury, Axiom slides out completely after a moment. When he pushes back in, the tentacle has joined his penis, the slight barb dragging back and forth uncomfortably against Maddock’s already sore insides. Apparently the pain is a two-way street because Axiom is gritting his teeth as he thrusts and cursing in his native tongue. A large sense of relief floods the alien when he comes, spilling himself inside of the human. Maddock is painfully hard now and when Axiom pulls out of him and stands, urging him to stand too, he laments his lack of opportunity to come. It’s nearly impossible for him to stop the tears rolling down his face as he gingerly pulls his jeans back into place. 

“Slave learned the rules, yes?” Nexium asks.

Maddock nods, not picking up his head.

“Easy lesson. Next time, the lesson not so easy. Now go.”

Going is far easier said than done. Shuffling alongside Axiom, Maddock wipes his face with his free arm and swears to kill Nexium if he ever gets the chance. The pair walk through the compound’s corridors for some time before Axiom opens a door and leads Maddock inside. The room is dark and when the light comes on, Axiom quickly secures the door, leaning against it and waiting to see if the human would speak to him. He doesn’t.

“Sorry. Axiom warned,” he says quietly.

Shaking his head, Maddock sinks to the floor with a hiss. Never would he ever have imagined finding himself in such a depraved and filthy position. If he could crawl under a rock, he would stay there until he died. Axiom sits across from him and stares down at his lap.

“Not easy. Axiom warned. Sorry. So sorry.”

“You had to do it, right?” Maddock asks, his throat raw.

“Superior Nexium kill both if no. Axiom help, no let friend dead.”

The alien sniffles and Maddock is shocked when translucent cerulean tears began to roll down teal cheeks, disappearing into the black of his uniform pants. His four fingered hands balls up against his leg as he begins to openly sob.

“Axiom no want hurt. Friend hate Axiom. So sorry, Maddock,” he hiccups.

Despite what had just happened, Maddock hated to see the sight before him. With a lot of effort, Maddock makes his way over to the alien, whom shakes his head but doesn’t push him away when he sits beside him and wraps an arm around his shoulder. Axiom presses his face to the man’s shoulder, repeating his apology over and over.

“It’s okay, Axiom. I don’t’ hate you. I hate that fucker that made you do it. Relax, I swear I don’t hate you,” Maddock assures.

The sound of his voice seems to only intensify the alien’s sobs until Maddock can take no more and pulls the alien into a deep kiss, cutting off his sobbing. Axiom tries to pull away at first, knowing he doesn’t deserve forgiveness, but the human holds strong to him and slides his tongue into his mouth, finally stilling the alien’s attempts. They melt into each other then, and when they part for air a few moments later, Axiom is visibly calmer, though his face is flushed and stray tears continue to stream down his cheeks. 

“Can I shower? Get clean, you know?” Maddock asks.

Nodding, the alien stands and helps Maddock to his feet. He then leads him to the next room, a bedroom, where a door leads them to a small room with a shower stall and a toilet. The Janxian turns on the shower and helps the man undress keeping his eyes down as he does so.

“Axiom go,” the alien says and leaves.

“This is all so fucked,” Maddock says aloud as he slips into the shower and presses his forehead against the wall. “So, so, so fucked.”

\--

The plan they devised beforehand is simple to carry out once they’ve infiltrated the Janxian compound. Axiom shows him blueprints of the compound; shows him where the exits are and how to go undetected. Janxian’s have sensitive hearing but are easy to distract with scents. Certain scents captivate them to the point where a bomb can go off three yards from them and they would hardly flinch. In small sacks, Axiom places some of these items – flowers and special Janxian spices – and affixes them onto a belt he gives Maddock to wear. He also gives him a uniform and with some paint, they are able to just make Maddock appear as close to an alien as they can. The obvious holes in their plans are his dark eye color and his five fingers, but that’s part of what the scents were for.

It takes several days, but eventually they put their plan into motion. Together they slip out of the room and hurry down the corridors. Few give them a second glance, though Maddock keeps his eyes hooded and his fists clenched just in case. Down several flights of stairs, they come to an area where slave pens are in various stage of completion. Only five are completed and only four hold several humans. The majority are on the far side of the room and it’s with a heavy pang that Maddock keeps himself from going over to them. Luckily, Axiom had been able to locate Aden and Tiny a day before in a pen closer to the exit, though neither one lifts their heads when Maddock approaches.

“Um, hey,” Maddock says, feeling lame once again in front of his long-time friends.

His voice catches their attention and they lift their heads to gawk in confusion at him. Tiny’s face quickly gives way to anger when she realizes she osn’t imaging things. Slamming her fist against the wall of her pen, she growls at him.

“You asshole!” she yells. “This is your fault! We were happy and fine where in our rooms, and then like bigger assholes, we listened to you. Where did that get us Dok, huh?”

“I don’t have a whole lot of time to tell you how right you are,” Maddock says as he begins to fiddle with the lock on their pen, “even though we’ve discovered something very important, okay? The Janxian superiors are planning to turn all of humanity into slaves. Us? This is nothing. Imagine the tens of thousands of people in very real danger and how fucked they’d be if not for our stupidity.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“And why are you dressed like one of them?” Aden asks.

“It’s a long, shitty story that I am never going to get into with either one of you, but suffice it to say, we have an ally and he’s helping me get you two out.”

“What about them?” Tiny asks, pointing at the other slave pens.

Maddock bites his lip. “I came to save you two. We’ll try to free the others later, if we can, but I can’t promise anything.”

“That’s just not right.” Aden frowns.

“I know! Nothing about any of this is right! Right now though, I’m focused on saving you two because I fucked up and I need to make it right.”

He gets their pen open but neither moves. 

“I need to get you to the nearest exit quickly, so please, come on,” Maddock urges. “I know what you’re both thinking, but the others will be safer where they are for now.”

“So why not leave us too?” Tiny crosses her arms.

“Like I said, I fucked up. I need to get you out of here so I can focus on the rest.”

Reluctantly, the two follow him back to the stairs where Axiom greets them. Understandably, Aden and Tiny’s first reaction is to hang their head and wince, but when Maddock reassures them, they look up to better study their help.

“What are your plans?” Aden asks the alien.

“Help Maddock friends. Stop superiors. Help.”

“And we can trust you why?” Tiny asks.

“Because he saved me, twice,” Maddock answers.

That seems to satisfy them. They go back up the stairs, carefully this time. When they leave the stairwell, they make a sharp left and follow the corridor all the way to a dead end. In the wall is a maintenance hatch that all but Axiom squeezes through. Maddock leads the way through the tight area until the hatch gives way to hundreds of pipes. He begins to climb them and his friends without prompting follow suit. There’s a crawlspace all the way at the top that leads to a small weakness in the ceiling, or so Axiom has told him. Maneuvering onto his back, Maddock prods the ceiling above him until part of it gives way and soil rains onto his face. Coughing, he turns his face to the side and pushes at the area harder. It isn’t happy about it, but eventually it gives way and moonlight filters through to him. He pulls himself out of the ground and reaches in to help first Tiny, and then Aden, out. They’re standing just outside of the clearing that led to Janxian compound.

“Can you see those building complexes over there? The bridge is just past them. Get yourselves out of here and back to the transport vehicle,” Maddock directs his friends.

“You’re not coming?” Aden asks.

Slipping back into the opening, Maddock shakes his head. “Nah, thought I might stick around here and help stop an alien takeover. Then I’m going to live like they did in the old world. Feel free to visit me out here anytime, if I survive.”

“Are you being sarcastic at a time like this, you dick?” Aden frowns.

Smiling, Maddock nods. “Thought it would be nice to leave you guys with a pleasant final memory of me just in case anything goes wrong.”

“So you’re serious about going back in there?”

“Axiom saved my life twice and I plan to repay him. Until I do, I’m not going anywhere he’s not.”

“Sounds like you’re in love or something,” Tiny laughs. When Maddock doesn’t join her, she looks surprised. “Oh.”

“It sounds crazy because you’ve only seen one side of them, but I’ve seen both sides – the good and bad. Deep down, the Janxians are just like us, different in their own way, yeah, but essentially the same as us.”

“Are you absolutely certain about this?” Aden asks.

“Do you really think after what I’m about to do, I’ll just be content with sitting in a room all day? I’m done with living on the grid and whenever you guys get tired of It too, you’ll know where to find me.” Maddock laughs before pressing himself into the passageway. “I love you guys, just so you know.”

The pair look ghostly in the moonlight, Maddock can’t help but notice, and smiles at them. They smile back, uncertain, before turning and heading the way he’d directed them to. Retracing his route, Maddock finds Axiom still waiting for him next to the entrance to the maintenance hatch. Axiom beams at the sight of him and Maddock feels glad for it.

“Axiom no sure Maddock come back,” the alien admits.

“I promised I would. You can always trust my word.”

Axiom nods his head and motions for the human to follow him. They had some work to do and they didn’t have much time to dawdle.

\--

Because the Janxians had been on Earth for so long, with no threats, they had heavily dropped the majority of their security procedures. If Maddock had to really place a name on the Janxian’s position on Earth, he would say they were bored, perhaps explaining why they now wanted to dominate the humans. According to Axiom, the idea originated from Nexium, whom was as close to the head of things as one could be. Most of the underlings like Axiom, opposed the idea, not seeing the point; it was the bored superiors that relished it. After meeting Nexium, Maddock relished the fact that the only way to stop the attempt takeover was to execute him. Without him, Axiom had revealed, the rest would calm down, lose interest. Maybe even leave the planet.

But killing a Janxian wasn’t an easy task, which was exactly why it was the perfect deterrent against them.

With it being night, most were asleep, allowing the pair to slip quickly through most of the compound undetected. The closer they got to Nexium’s living quarters, the scant bit of security began to show itself. Guards patrolled the corridors leading to it. Here is when the pouches Axiom had prepared came in handy. Covering his nose with a towel, Axiom nods for Maddock to open the first pouch and throw it down the corridor. There’s a bust of confusion at first but then the guards all swarm to where the open pouch landed, clicking happily at the scent. They repeat the tactic several times until the corridor before Nexium’s room is free of opposition. Now, however, things would get hard.

“Scent no work well superiors,” Axiom explains. “Catch Nexium off guard yes. Boom.”

This part confuses Maddock until the alien produces two bombs from his pocket. They’re small but the instant he throws the first, it punches out the door to Nexium’s living quarters. They rush in, knowing time was short, and drop to the floor to avoid any gunfire, which comes in a deafening burst above their heads. Axiom throws the second bomb in the general direction of the shooting and the both of them blindly scramble through the smoke and dust from the first explosion as the second goes off. The gunfire hiccups and it’s enough to make Maddock charge forward, grabbing a large pipe that had been blown free from an interior wall. He can just see a shape within the second bomb cloud, and swings at it, hearing an instant clang of metal against metal. His momentum is used against him, a push sending him stumbling backward. When Nexium steps forward, Maddock tightens his grip on the pipe.

“I see slave angry,” he says, “plan to kill superior Nexium, yes? Stupid slave. Stupid Man. Always fighting, scared of self. Janxian make you happy and still you angry. Why?”

“Must be something in my nature,” Maddock answers with a small smile. “What makes you think it’s okay to enslave my kind?”

Nexium laughs. “Boredom. Good for morale to do something fun.”

“You’re sick.”

He shrugs nonchalantly. “You’re dead.”

The gun aims, and fires.

\--

This time no one dies. Maddock and his friends make it to the City, fall in love with the old world, and decide to live out the rest of their lives there.

Or so he dreams.

Maddock yawns as he awakens, shielding his eyes from the sunlight pouring through his window. He sits up and winces when his injured shoulder decides it’s not in a happy position. Rolling it, he stretches his arm out and accidentally brushes his fingers against a naked teal chest beside him. Axiom makes a click and opens an eye.

“Pain?” he asks.

“A bit,” Maddock admits, “but it’s nothing to worry about. How are you?”

Axiom touches the bandage around his midsection and nods. “Good.”

Maddock places his hand over the alien’s bandage and smiles. He replays the last few days in his mind, thinking back to when Nexium shot him, but missed his intended target thanks to Axiom rushing him. The two crashed into a wall where they struggled. The gun went off, ripping through Axiom’s stomach and back. When he fell away, Nexium laughed, thinking he had won, but the bomb Axiom slipped into his clothes went off.

It was a messy fight, in all.

The other Janxians had found Maddock and Axiom on the floor and when they realized what had happened, they quickly cared for them, clicking their appreciation. Maddock really hadn’t expected them to be so welcoming to the death of one of their own, but that had been what happened. That had been three days ago and most Janxians had departed to their home planet, long missing it. The humans in the slave pens had been released, but with the trauma they’d endured, most were unable to do much but loiter about the compound and later, the area of the City near the bridge.

Maddock was content with staying behind and exploring more of the City, especially when Axiom had agreed to stay behind as well. Because of his hand in Nexium’s death, Axiom was promoted to a position of superior and as such, planned to find a way to help break out the humans from the routine lives they led, but it would take some time. 

Maddock was eager to help.

“Do good today?” Axiom asks, finally sitting up.

“Yeah, a lot of good to do today, but first…”

Maddock straddles Axiom’s lap and kisses him.


End file.
